RAN 90 MILES

Taranaki Daily News, 9 November 1935, Page 19 (Supplement)

RAN 90 MILES

BLACKFELLOW OF AUSTRALIA.

SERVICE TO WHITE FRIEND.

A remarkable story. is told by the airman Captain Hans Bertram about one of the blackfellows named Hector, who helped to save his life and that of his companion. Hector was one of the Kimberley natives who, when Captain Bertram m'ade a forced landing in desolate bush, brought food and water to the airmen and kept guard over the machine.

Hector, a native connected with the Forrest River Mission, ran 90 miles over wild and difficult country in 48 hours, taking no rest at all, to bring assistance to the stranded flying-men. While Captain Bertram was away, pending the rescue of his machine, the blackfellows kept guard over the plane, and not a bolt or a nut was missing. Surely, says the Rev. J. S. Needham, chairman of the Australian Board of Missions, these people deserve better treatment than has been theirs in the past. The treatment deplored-is that of neglect, and it arises because the Governments of the Commonwealth are ignorant of the needs of the aborigines, with many of whom they are in no sort of touch. In Western Australia there may be as many as 20,000 blackfellows in. contact with civilisation, but 10,000 who are not. The conditions of life of these wild, untutored people lends itself to abuses for which there is no redress and at the same time no attempt is made by education or otherwise to improve their lot. A resolution was adopted by a Methodist Church conference at Melbourne urging that a special court for aborigines should be established.

This procedure, or something resembling it, has been adopted in West Africa, where the native has grown in many instances to a position of importance and responsibility; and it is being followed by necessity in other parts of Africa where white and black are in necessary contact.